Window Layer Thickness Effect on Amorphous Silicon Oxide Solar Cell Performances

Abstract

The recent research and developments of a-Si:H based solar cells have greatly promoted its position as low cost solar cell. Unfortunately, a-Si:H solar cells suffer appreciable light induced degradation for thickness greater than 200nm. It has been reported that boron doped hydrogenated amorphous silicon oxide (p-a-SiOx:H) films have a low temperature coefficient compared to those based on hydrogenated amorphous silicon (p-a-Si:H) . Moreover, the solar cells with a p-a-SiOx: H generate more electricity than the solar cells with p-a-Si: H window layer due to the wider band gap (Eg) of these films. We present in this paper a computer simulation on the effects of window layer thickness on the performances of single junction amorphous silicon oxide solar cells. We varied the thickness of the window layer from 5 nm to 25 nm and our simulation results showed that cells parameters are significantly affected window layer thickness. However, the film thickness of the p-a-SiOx:H window layer increased from 5 nm to 25 nm, the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of the solar cells respectively decreased in the ranges of 5.733% to 5.271% .the simulation data are in good agreement with the literature